Skip Grinberg, chair of the Community Relation Council of the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, will join the national board of directors of the Jewish Council of Public Affairs. He will be installed at the JCPA Plenum, which runs from March 9 to 12 in Washington, D.C.

Grinberg will join another Pittsburgher, Mark Frank, who is already on the board.

“I was nominated by Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh,” Grinberg said. “It goes to a national nominating committee and they’re the ones who make the selection.”

He plans to learn about the board’s work before anything else.

“I want to understand their procedures and how they operate,” Grinberg said. “That being the case, I know a number of policy statements are coming up [at the plenum] which are of interest to me.”

Among the topics to be addressed at this year’s plenum are, “Equal Opportunity and Social Justice,” “Israel, World Jewry and International Human Rights,” “Jewish Security and the Bill of Rights,” Reframing the Zionist Narrative,” “Israel’s Domestic Challenges and Traditional Advocacy: Finding the Right Balance,” “Our Brother’s and Sister’s Keeper: Protecting Jewish Communities Abroad” and “Jewish Consensus and Controversy: Same Sex Relationships.”

Established in 1944, the JCPA describes itself as “the representative voice of the organized American Jewish community.” It also serves as a coordinating roundtable organization of 14 other national Jewish organizations (the “National Member Agencies”) as well as 127 local Jewish federations and community relations councils.

Among the speakers at this year’s plenum are Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren, the Atlantic staff writer Jeffrey Goldberg and JCPA President Rabbi Steve Gutow.